Jakarta –
Prime Minister of Israel Naftali Bennett meet with Vladimir Putin Saturday in the Kremlin. It was the Russian president’s second meeting with a foreign leader since his troops invaded Ukraine last week.
Bennett, who has so far not joined other foreign leaders in condemning the Russian attack, stressed Israel’s strong ties to Moscow and Kyiv. Ukraine had previously asked Bennett to mediate.
A statement from Bennett’s office said the prime minister “left this morning for Moscow, after speaking with President Putin last Wednesday,” he said.
Bennett was a religious Jew who did not conduct official business on Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, except in exceptional circumstances.
An Israeli official said the Kremlin talks lasted three hours.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian news agencies that Putin and Bennett were “discussing the situation in Ukraine.”
The meeting appears to be the first with a foreign leader devoted to the Ukraine conflict.
Putin received Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan at the Kremlin on the day the invasion began, in a long-scheduled visit that was widely seen as ill-timed.
On Monday, Khan defended the trip – the first by a Pakistani leader to Russia in more than two decades.
“My foreign policy is independent and visits to China and Russia will prove beneficial to Pakistan in the future,” he said in a televised address.
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(eva / eva)
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